Oral history with Gabriel Kele Longange

Track 1:

00:00 Interview introduction by interviewer

01:08 Papy introduces himself and his family background back ground

02:08 Talks about his childhood and attending Catholic Church choir

03:05 Education: school, five years in a Brussels school, back to the Democratic Republic of Congo for boarding school and then higher education in ethnomusicology

04:22 Current family situation and children

06:07 Shares about his fathers music career in the army

10:04 Papy’s work as an ethnomusicologist, Emmanuela’s research and has it has inspired him

15:26 Talks about musical traditions in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Track 2:

00:06 Variety of musical traditions amongst the different peoples in the Congo (Kinshasa) but the commonality of rhythm in all the music

02:34 Gives more examples of music genres in the Central African region e.g. games music like the water drum and hunting music

08:30 Papy talks about the artists he has worked with including the Pende, Bateke, Congo-Brazzaville, Gabon and Chokwe peoples etc

10:54 Talks about Pende people performing with their masks, and compares music from different areas of the Congo (Kinshasa), including singing extracts from three songs from different areas

16:00 Discusses other (academic) work related to Emmanuela’s research

17:57 Talks about musical traditions of the Bakongo people including performing an example of a chant

20:22 Papy talks about the participatory nature of African music

21:50 Talks about the movement of the population to urban areas and this affecting the practice of musical traditions

Track 3:

00:10 Traditionally African music is a soloist and those accompanying them, analysis of the four families or instruments and songs from different ethnic groups demonstrates no monotony in the music

05:20 Discusses a Xylophone Sur Tronc De Bananier (Xylophone on a banana tree trunk) which is disposable and made for each performance

07:20 Reviews photographs of instruments and performances of different groups including the Mangbetu and Azande people

09:14: Talks about Emmanuela’s future research

Track 4:

00:00 Papy talks about African classification of musical instruments into four families: Aerophone, Chordophones, Membranophones, Idiophones

04:18 Talks about the different music genres in Africa and the different things that they are used for e.g. entertaining, specific rituals etc

06:06 Talks on how the geographical origins of a song can be identified although the authors are unknown due to it being a mainly oral tradition